Newbs might not know this, but bitcoin recently came out of an intense internal drama. Between July 2015 and August 2017 bitcoin was attacked by external forces who were hoping to destroy the very properties that made bitcoin valuable in the first place. This culminated in the creation of segwit and the UASF (user activated soft fork) movement. The UASF was successful, segwit was added to bitcoin and with that the anti-decentralization side left bitcoin altogether and created their own altcoin called bcash. Bitcoin's price was $2500, soon after segwit was activated the price doubled to $5000 and continued rising until here we are today at $15000.During this drama, I took time away from writing open source code to help educate and argue on reddit, twitter and other social media. I came up with a reading list for quickly copypasting things. It may be interesting today for newbs or anyone who wants a history lesson on what exactly happened during those two years when bitcoin's very existence as a decentralized low-trust currency was questioned. Now the fight has essentially been won, I don't comment on reddit that much anymore. There's nothing left to do except wait for Lightning and similar tech to become mature (or better yet, help code it and test it)In this thread you can learn about block sizes, latency, decentralization, segwit, ASICBOOST, lightning network and all the other issues that were debated endlessly for over two years. So when someone tries to get you to invest in bcash, remind them of the time they supported Bitcoin Unlimited :PSummary / The fundamental tradeoffA trip to the moon requires a rocket with multiple stages by gmaxwell (must read) http://bit.ly/2zEhKXu Cohen, creator of bittorrent, argues against a hard fork to a larger block size http://bit.ly/2C17bE6's summary of the debate http://bit.ly/2zCRYTw devs please explain your vision (see luke's post which also argues that blocks are already too big) http://bit.ly/2BZr3Yi of r/btc speaking against a hard fork http://bit.ly/2zEi48I's becoming clear to me that a lot of people don't understand how fragile bitcoin is http://bit.ly/2BZlwkp space must be costly, it can never be free http://bit.ly/2zEtk57 Lee with a nice analogy about the fundamental tradeoff http://bit.ly/2BZ7b7r on the tradeoffs http://bit.ly/2zCQeJT on the layering http://bit.ly/2BZr5zo on-chain will destroy bitcoin's decentralizationPeter Todd: How a floating blocksize limit inevitably leads towards centralization [Feb 2013] http://bit.ly/1EDZj1i mailing list http://bit.ly/2BZr5PU with discussion on reddit in Aug 2015 http://bit.ly/2zEQLuQ Szabo's blog post on what makes bitcoin so special http://bit.ly/2BZr66q is academic research showing that even small (2MB) increases to the blocksize results in drastic node dropoff counts due to the non-linear increase of RAM needed. http://bit.ly/2zDi4pz summary of above link. In this table, you can see it estimates a 40% drop immediately in node count with a 2MB upgrade and a 50% over 6 months. At 4mb, it becomes 75% immediately and 80% over 6 months. At 8, it becomes 90% and 95%. http://bit.ly/2C2mEU8 block sizes make centralization pressures worse (mathematical) http://bit.ly/2zEiUCj at scalingbitcoin montreal, initial blockchain synchronization puts serious constraints on any increase in the block size https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgjrS-BPWDQ&t=2h02m06s with transcript http://bit.ly/2BZr6mW's P2P Network: The Soft Underbelly of Bitcoin https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6kibPzbrIc someone's notes: http://bit.ly/2zEi3la reddit discussion http://bit.ly/2BZr6Ds adversarial environments blockchains dont scale http://bit.ly/2zEAy8V miners will not voluntarily individually produce smaller blocks http://bit.ly/2BZr7r0 Finney: bitcoin's blockchain can only be a settlement layer (mostly interesting because it's hal finney and its in 2010) http://bit.ly/2zDNj3O's 2013 video explaining this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZp7UGgBR0Iluke-jr's summary http://bit.ly/2BZr8ey jratcliff thread http://bit.ly/2zEiUSP blocks are not a disasterBlocks must be always full, there must always be a backlog http://bit.ly/2C1u9Ll as above, the mining gap means there must always be a backlog talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2453&v=iKDC2DpzNbw transcript: http://bit.ly/2zEZuNH arent that bad http://bit.ly/2BZra6a where scarce block space causes people to use precious resources more efficiently http://bit.ly/2zDQ9px blocks are fine http://bit.ly/2BZUiKq miner fees imply a sustainable future for bitcoin http://bit.ly/2zEC7E6 on why full blocks are good http://bit.ly/2C1qld7 whole idea of the mempool being "filled" is wrong headed. The mempool doesn't "clog" or get stuck, or anything like that. http://bit.ly/2zDQatB is segwitluke-jr's longer summary http://bit.ly/2BZTbdz Shrem's on upgrading to segwit https://twitter.com/CharlieShrem/status/842711238853513220Original segwit talk at scalingbitcoin hong kong + transcript https://youtu.be/zchzn7aPQjI?t=110https://scalingbitcoin.org/transcript/hongkong2015/segregated-witness-and-its-impact-on-scalabilitySegwit is not too complex http://bit.ly/2zEAxln does not make it possible for miners to steal coins, contrary to what some people say http://bit.ly/2C1bLlw is required for a useful lightning network It's now known that without a malleability fix useful indefinite channels are not really possible.http://bit.ly/2zEC8Ia up SegWit Lies and Myths: http://bit.ly/2C3h43Z is bigger blocks http://bit.ly/2zDi5K9 usage results in segwit allowing capacity equivalent to 2mb blocks http://bit.ly/2C17cYG is segwit being blockedJihan Wu (head of largest bitcoin mining group) is blocking segwit because of perceived loss of income http://bit.ly/2zDVH35 discount creates aligned incentives http://bit.ly/2C1bLC2 http://bit.ly/2zDVGfx because he wants his mining enterprise to have control over bitcoin http://bit.ly/2C2mFYc is being blocked because it breaks ASICBOOST, a patented optimization used by bitmain ASIC manufacturerDetails and discovery by gmaxwell http://bit.ly/2zDipZv thread with discussion http://bit.ly/2BZodSQ explaination by jonny1000 http://bit.ly/2zEaESI http://bit.ly/2BZmgWt admits their chips have asicboost but they say they never used it on the network (haha a likely story) http://bit.ly/2zEq6yr $100m per year to them (also in gmaxwell's original email) https://twitter.com/petertoddbtc/status/849798529929424898Other calculations show less http://bit.ly/2C1bOxI also blocks all these other cool updates, not just segwit http://bit.ly/2zEC7UC of bad consequences of asicboost http://bit.ly/2C0DV0h's summary of the entire situation http://bit.ly/2zCRZH4 goes up because now segwit looks more likely https://twitter.com/TuurDemeester/status/849846845425799168Asicboost discovery made the price rise https://twitter.com/TuurDemeester/status/851520094677200901A pool was caught red handed doing asicboost, by this time it seemed fairly certain that segwit would get activated so it didnt produce as much interest as earlier http://bit.ly/2C1nrFa and http://bit.ly/2zD12YK and https://twitter.com/petertoddbtc/status/889475196322811904What if segwit never activatesWhat if segwit never activates? http://bit.ly/2BZGLSX with http://bit.ly/2zDipbX and http://bit.ly/2BZY5aB's series on what lightning is and how it works http://bit.ly/2zDVHjB http://bit.ly/2BZY5r7 http://bit.ly/2zDNjAQ Lightning Network ELIDHDICACS (Explain Like I Don’t Have Degrees in Cryptography and Computer Science) http://bit.ly/2BZY5HD will increases fees for miners, not lower them http://bit.ly/2zEiUlN analysis of lightning from the point of view of miners http://bit.ly/2BZY5Y9 blog post by rusty http://bit.ly/1P3t94J and reddit comments http://bit.ly/2BZywXd protocol rfc http://bit.ly/2zEQOqw post with screenshots of ln being used on testnet http://bit.ly/2BYAerM video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxGiMu4V7nsVideo of sending and receiving ln on testnet https://twitter.com/alexbosworth/status/844030573131706368Lightning tradeoffs http://bit.ly/2zDQc4H sold for testnet lightning http://bit.ly/2BZY6eF and https://twitter.com/MrHodl/status/848265171269283845Lightning will result in far fewer coins being stored on third parties because it supports instant transactions http://bit.ly/2zEOvUy argues strongly against LN, he owns a coin tracking startup https://twitter.com/petertoddbtc/status/860826532650123264 https://twitter.com/Beautyon_/status/886128801926795264luke's great debunking / answer of some misinformation questions http://bit.ly/2BZrcuO centralization doesnt happen http://bit.ly/2zDyvSC on hubs and charging fees https://twitter.com/roasbeef/status/930209165728825344 and https://twitter.com/roasbeef/status/930210145790976000Immutability / Being a swiss bank in your pocket / Why doing a hard fork (especially without consensus) is damagingA downside of hard forks is damaging bitcoin's immutability http://bit.ly/2BZlxEZ analysis of miners incentives and how failure is possible, don't trust the miners for long term http://bit.ly/2zDNkVq on the meaning of cash and settlement http://bit.ly/2BZTbu5 on the cash question http://bit.ly/2zEOuQu gold funamentalists gain nothing from supporting a hard fork to larger block sizes http://bit.ly/2BZmgpr asking for a compromise don't understand the underlying political forces http://bit.ly/2zCRZXA wants a contentious hard fork actually, anti-core people got emotionally manipulated http://bit.ly/2BZGMX1 hard work of the core developers has kept bitcoin scalable http://bit.ly/2zDirR7 PRs to improve bitcoin scaleability ignored by the debate https://twitter.com/jfnewbery/status/883001356168167425gmaxwell against hard forks since 2013 http://bit.ly/2BZTcy9: hard forks are really bad http://bit.ly/2zDitbH metrics on what the market thinks of decentralization and hostile hard forksThe price history shows that the exchange rate drops every time a hard fork threatens: http://bit.ly/2C0DbIn this example from 2017 https://twitter.com/WhalePanda/status/845562763820912642http://imgur.com/a/DuHAn r/btc users lose moneyprice supporting theymos' moderation http://bit.ly/2zDi7Sh version http://bit.ly/2C3h4B1 version http://bit.ly/2zFRAUw 50% of nodes updated to the soft fork node quite quickly http://bit.ly/2BZUjhs Unlimited / Emergent Consensus is badly designed, changes the game theory of bitcoinBitcoin Unlimited was a proposed hard fork client, it was made with the intention to stop segwit from activatingA Future Led by Bitcoin Unlimited is a Centralized Future http://bit.ly/2zEtnxP transactions are bugged http://bit.ly/2BZyw9F BU software mines an invalid block, wasting 13 bitcoins or $12khttps://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/5qwtr2/bitcoincom_loses_132btc_trying_to_fork_the/https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/5qx18i/bitcoincom_loses_132btc_trying_to_fork_the/bitcoin.com employees are moderators of r/btc http://bit.ly/2zDVIUH don't control stuff like the block size http://bit.ly/2BYAeIi gavin agreed that economic majority controls things http://bit.ly/2zEiX0X clients are trying to steal bitcoin's brand and network effect, theyre no different from altcoins http://bit.ly/2BZGNdx being active makes it easier to reverse payments, increases wasted work making the network less secure and giving an advantage to bigger miners http://bit.ly/2zDWWj5 unlimited takes power away from users and gives it to miners http://bit.ly/2BZUitU unlimited's accepted depth https://twitter.com/tdryja/status/804770009272696832BU's lying propaganda poster http://bit.ly/2zEq7lZ is bugged, poorly-reviewed and crashesbitcoin unlimited allegedly funded by kraken stolen coinshttps://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/55ajuh/taint_analysis_on_bitcoin_stolen_from_kraken_on/https://www.reddit.com/r/btc/comments/559miz/taint_analysis_on_btc_allegedly_stolen_from_kraken/Other funding stuffhttps://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/5zozmn/damning_evidence_on_how_bitcoin_unlimited_pays/A serious bug in BU http://ift.tt/2pGXi8N summary of what's wrong with BU: http://ift.tt/2E0l9Dk Unlimited Remote Exploit Crash 14/3/2017https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/5zdkv3/bitcoin_unlimited_remote_exploit_crash/ http://ift.tt/2nBJiY7 http://ift.tt/2pGXjJT devs calling it as disaster https://twitter.com/SooMartindale/status/841758265188966401 also r/btc deleted a thread about the exploit http://ift.tt/2E2cSPA of incident http://ift.tt/2pJWznk than 20 exchanges will list BTU as an altcoinhttps://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/5zyg6g/bitcoin_exchanges_unveil_emergency_hard_fork/Again a few days later http://ift.tt/2pGXoNH Activated Soft Fork (UASF)site for it, including list of businesses supporting it http://www.uasf.co/luke's viewhttps://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/5zsk45/i_am_shaolinfry_author_of_the_recent_user/df1dqen/?context=3threat of UASF makes the miner fall into line in litecoinhttps://www.reddit.com/r/litecoin/comments/66omhr/litecoin_global_roundtable_resolution/dgk2thk/?context=3UASF delivers the goods for vertcoinhttps://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/692mi3/in_test_case_uasf_results_in_miner_consensus/dh3cm34/?context=1UASF coin is more valuable http://ift.tt/2pJCRYT the links together in one place http://ift.tt/2E0Xzq1 was a uasf http://ift.tt/2pGXu81 annoyed at the strict timeline that segwit2x has to follow because of bip148 https://twitter.com/jgarzik/status/886605836902162432Committed intolerant minority http://ift.tt/2E11PGl on the game theory of the intolerant minority http://ift.tt/2pHJBpX delivered the goods for bitcoin, it forced antpool and others to signal (May 2016) http://ift.tt/2l2mU8q "When asked specifically whether Antpool would run SegWit code without a hard fork increase in the block size also included in a release of Bitcoin Core, Wu responded: “No. It is acceptable that the hard fork code is not activated, but it needs to be included in a ‘release’ of Bitcoin Core. I have made it clear about the definition of ‘release,’ which is not ‘public.’”"Screenshot of peter rizun capitulating https://twitter.com/chris_belcher_/status/905231603991007232Fighting off 2x HFhttps://twitter.com/MrHodl/status/895089909723049984https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/6h612o/can_someone_explain_to_me_why_core_wont_endorse/?st=j6ic5n17&sh=cc37ee23https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/6smezz/segwit2x_hard_fork_is_completely_useless_its_a/?st=j6ic2aw3&sh=371418ddhttps://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/6sbspv/who_exactly_is_segwit2x_catering_for_now_segwit/?st=j6ic5nic&sh=1f86caddhttps://medium.com/@elliotolds/lesser-known-reasons-to-keep-blocks-small-in-the-words-of-bitcoin-core-developers-44861968185eb2x is most of all about firing core https://twitter.com/WhalePanda/status/912664487135760384https://medium.com/@StopAndDecrypt/thats-not-bitcoin-this-is-bitcoin-95f05a6fd6c2Misinformation / sockpuppetshttps://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/6uqz6k/markets_update_bitcoin_cash_rallies_for_three/dlurbpx/three year old account, only started posting today http://ift.tt/2pGXwwF article that covers virtually all the important history http://ift.tt/2E0pVki post with some history pre-2015 http://ift.tt/2pHDvWH core scalabality roadmap + my summary from 3/2017 http://ift.tt/1Zm3n26 my summary http://ift.tt/2E0pWES from summer 2015 http://ift.tt/2pJCUUz reminders of the ETC situation http://ift.tt/2E0pXIW writeup of ethereum's TheDAO bailout fraud http://ift.tt/2pIRRpY that the bigblocker side is only blocking segwit as a hostage http://ift.tt/2E2dgxx's recall of the history of r/bitcoin http://ift.tt/2pL29Wu (mostly memes)hard fork proposals from some core devs http://ift.tt/2E0q1sa hasnt taken over the entire bitcoin core project http://ift.tt/2pHoZhS is one of the good guys http://ift.tt/2E0q5Iq stuff here along with that cool photoshopped poster http://ift.tt/2pJD0vp graphic https://twitter.com/RNR_0/status/871070843698380800gmaxwell saying how he is probably responsible for the most privacy tech in bitcoin, while mike hearn screwed up privacy http://ift.tt/2E4xGpC cool propaganda poster https://twitter.com/urbanarson/status/880476631583924225btc tankman http://ift.tt/2tdz7wW https://twitter.com/DanDarkPill/status/853653168151986177asicboost discovery meme https://twitter.com/allenscottoshi/status/849888189124947971https://twitter.com/urbanarson/status/882020516521013250gavin wanted to kill the bitcoin chain https://twitter.com/allenscottoshi/status/849888189124947971stuff that r/btc believes http://ift.tt/2pJD26v segwit2x NYA got agreed all the fee pressure disappeared, laurenmt found they were artificial spam https://twitter.com/i/moments/885827802775396352theymos saying why victory isnt inevitable http://ift.tt/2DZHsJz ignorant enemies like these its no wonder we won http://ift.tt/2CdJKEo ""So, once segwit2x activates, from that moment on it will require a coordinated fork to avoid the up coming "baked in" HF. ""a positive effect of bcash, it made blockchain utxo spammers move away from bitcoin http://ift.tt/2pJD2Dx of craig wright, jihan wu and roger ver's positions http://ift.tt/2DZHuBb happened to #oldjeffgarzik http://ift.tt/2pJlash blockers fully deserve to lose every last bitcoin they ever had and more http://ift.tt/2DZHwJj brainstorming how to kill bitcoin with a 51% in a nasty way https://twitter.com/btcdrak/status/843914877542567937 via /r/Bitcoin http://ift.tt/2Dn2Uai
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